


A Gambit For The Ages (or at least the next half hour)

by Qwerty_2poynt0



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Birthday Fluff, Breakfast, Cute, Early Mornings, Fluff, Gen, Glitter, How Do I Tag, Pranks and Practical Jokes, Prankster's Gambit, Tooth-Rotting Fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-04-13
Updated: 2019-04-13
Packaged: 2020-01-11 18:35:31
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,933
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18429779
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Qwerty_2poynt0/pseuds/Qwerty_2poynt0
Summary: John half expected the wall to respond to his diatribe, but he could only hear the ac humming above the soft breeze rustling the leaves of the tree in his yard. God, it was weird to think about how he essentially owned the house now. Dad had been over at Jane's for the past week, since her birthday was coming up.Wait a minute."HOLY SHIT it's my birthday!"In which John wakes up at a wholly unreasonable hour of the morning and Jane is a habitual sleuth.





	A Gambit For The Ages (or at least the next half hour)

   John sat up and stared blankly at the equally blank wall. He'd spent a good chunk of his time exploring the planet,  helping his sister and the others with what they were doing once they'd all ectobio'd a sufficient amount of babies into existence and scattered them to the proverbial winds. Or... maybe it was literal??? Either way, he hadn't really found the time to re-coustomize his room.

   "Hello wall, how are you this morning?"

   The wall didn't respond, but that was to be expected. The wall was very shy.

   "I know I should probably get out of bed, but I mean, it's practically 0 Dark 30."

   The wall kept its input to itself. Understandable, it had no concept of sleep schedules and precisely how fucked John's was.

   "... You're a lot different from my old wall, y'know. Lot less clowns."

   The wall remained silent. Though of course now John supposed the responsibility for that fell to the confusion the wall must be suffering.

   "I wonder how my old house is doing. Does it even still exist? Ugh, you'd think I'd have a better understanding of how all that works but surprise surprise, I don't."

   In the end, the wall remained a wall.

   "Yeah, okay, I probably sound like a crazy person." John negotiated his way out of the sheets. "I'm not usually like this, y'know." John stretched and scooted to the end of his bed in order to sit closer to this wall he was for so intent on conversing with for some reason. "In fact, I get after Dave for doing this exact thing a whole lot. Talking to himself, I mean. I guess I'm still used to greeting my movie posters every morning. Or if not my movie posters, my dad. And if not my dad, Jade or Nana or the consorts. And if not them, I've been crashing at everyone else's places and taking naps wherever lately, so it's usually very easy to find someone or something to say good morning to that makes more sense than my blank bedroom wall. Come to think of it, you don't usually see me a lot. I guess I feel kinda bad about it. Maybe that's why I'm talking to you; I feel the need to reassure you that I care. Even if you are just a wall."

   John half expected the wall to respond to his diatribe, but he could only hear the ac humming above the soft breeze rustling the leaves of the tree in his yard. God, it was weird to think about how he essentially owned the house now. Dad had been over at Jane's for the past week, since her birthday was coming up.

    _Wait a minute._

   "HOLY SHIT it's my birthday!" John sprang to his feet and his voice echoed in the room a little. A small breeze rustled his hair in tandem with his sudden realization that April 13th had arrived seemingly right out of fuckin' nowhere.

   A car pulled into the driveway and John snapped his head around to look out the window. That sure looked an awful lot like his dad's car.

   Out of a strange... something that was half impulse half reflex, John ducked beneath the window sill and peeked out over the driveway. It only then occurred to him that he didn't have his eyes. He scampered over to the bedside table on all fours and fumbled with his glasses before zipping back over to the window, making sure to press close to the wall so he couldn't be seen. Dad had just climbed out of the car that John recognized for sure now was the same whatever-model-you-call-it that he'd been chauffeured around in for as long as he could remember, (John and Jane had set about using their expert alchemy skillz to un-total it) and there was Jane and Casey and what were they doing here so early????

    _They must have wanted to wake me up._ John reasoned with himself.

   They walked up the sidewalk (well, Casey waddled more than walked with her scarf dragging behind her as it always did) and John realized he should probably get back into bed if he wanted to be a good sport.

   On the other hand...

   John rifled through his sylladex fast as he could. He had three cups of jello (red, blue, and orange), a little bell a consort had given him a while ago, a silly hat, a bottle of water, an assorted pile of beads, marbles, buttons and string, a lime green wig, -the sound of the front door opening hopped up the stairs. He didn't have much time- some glitter for _some reason_ , and two burnt out lightbulbs.

   He could work with this. He could absolutely work with this.

   Jane had long since forbidden John from using his retcon powers for pranking, saying it gave him a grossly unfair advantage and that 'No son of hers was going to be engaging in one-sided, unsportsmanly tomfoolery.' She only pulled out the mom card when she was  _really_ trying to get something through his skull, and boy howdy did it always work. Because of this, he had to get a little creative with the limited time he had, but that was part of the fun.

   He didn't hear them coming up the stairs. Were they making him breakfast? Well now he kinda felt a little bad.

   No! He was going to _relish_ the prankster's gambit swinging in his favor! It was his birthday, after all. Well, his and Jane's. But they had the whole rest of the day for her to get her share of the gambit.

   He opened his window and floated his way down to the ground. His feet were soaked in short order from the dripping wet grass. It had rained just enough last night to where the ground had softened and everything turned at least a little damp, but not enough for any expansive puddles or squelchy mud to appear. The chilly feeling on the soles of John's feet gave him a strange sense of determination as he pulled the little bell from his sylladex and ducked below the kitchen window. He heard the telltale 'cl-clunk' of the saloon doors to the kitchen being passed through and footsteps on the linoleum floor as the light switched on.

   John was glad the sun hadn't quite crested the horizon, which meant there was no glare on the window from his side as he hazarded a peek inside. There was Dad and there was Jane and waddling along behind them was dear, sweet Casey. John ducked back down quickly and began to scheme.

    _They'll likely start in on pancakes. Then after the pancakes, some bacon and eggs. They might even make biscuits if they're feeling particularly zealous._

   That gave him plenty of time. He inched out from beneath the window and dashed around the back of the house to the door of the utility room, making sure not to stop in front of it in case Dad or Jane saw him through the window on the door in the kitchen. The breeze ushered him along and he smiled wide. A very clear idea was forming in his mind, and if he was sneaky enough, he could do it. This was shaping up to be the best birthday in 17 years.

~+~

   Jane heard a tiny muffled ringing from behind her and turned her head towards it. All she saw was Casey between the hutch and the door to the utility room blowing bubbles. The view felt... so familiar in such an unfamiliar way. This was the same house she'd spent 16 years living in, and yet it wasn't. 

   The ringing happened again. It was coming from the utility room and Dad noticed this time, too. This needed investigating.

   "I'll see what it is." She told Dad. He nodded to her and continued with the cake batter. He insisted John be woken up with a slice of birthday cake to go along with his breakfast, despite the fact that they were already making pancakes. Jane loved him.

   She gently opened the door to the utility room and looked around. The window was open, and on the washing machine sat... a marble? She walked up to it and picked it up to examine. Yes, just an ordinary everyday marble.

   Jane heard the bell again; it was coming from outside. She opened the door to the backyard, marble in hand, and looked around. Nothing. She rounded the corner and took in the side of the house. Nope, not a single thing.

   The bell sounded again. It was inside this time. She made her way quickly inside and when she entered, there was a trail of buttons and beads and marbles leading back into the kitchen. This was... quite peculiar. She picked them all up one by one as she made her way to the door, then reentered the kitchen. Dad looked over his shoulder at her and raised an eyebrow.

   "I didn't find anything but these." She showed him her new collection of baubles and he drew his eyebrows together, clearly just as confused as she was.The mystery center of her brain started kicking into high gear.

    _You know fairies don't exist, and even though ghosts do, they all live somewhere else. The window was open, so we have to assume whatever or whoever is leaving all these things around got in through there, except the bell was coming from outside until I walked out to look. Which means it must have been too big to fit though the window. So, the remaining question then is, is whoever is doing this still in the house?_

   Jane figured she would have heard the footsteps going in and out of the utility room from around the corner. She also thought it was impossible for the buttons and such to appear there in such short order if an average person were placing them. And surely a consort couldn't be doing these things, that wouldn't line up in the slightest.

    _So we're looking for something too big to fit through the window that doesn't make any sound._

   There was the bell again, and this time it was in the living room. Jane scampered off through the doors, but it didn't last long because she was pushed back at the shoulders by a string tied between the posts of the doors and slid on something, landing square on her backside and dropping the beads and buttons and marbles.

   It was this spectacular part fall that made her situation clear to her.

   She was being pranked.

   Dad rushed over to help her up and Casey gathered the marbles and the buttons and the beads. Jane noticed that what she had slipped on was a lime green wig that slid across the hard wood floors quite well. She dusted herself off and picked up the offending headdress. John was very likely too big to fit through the utility room window, it was the smallest windown in the house, and of course he wouldn't make footsteps because _he could fly_.

   "Oh I see how it is, Egbert." Jane said, a smile spreading across her face. "Well you won't be bamboozling me a second time, no siree bob."

   Jane turned around and promptly got a faceful of glitter.

   "Happy birthday Jane!"

   John smiled big and bright and slightly smug as Jane blinked the glitter out of her eyes.

   "Alright, you win this round." Jane sighed. "But you just watch your back buster!"

   John chuckled and breezed into the kitchen. 

   "So! What's for breakfast?"

**Author's Note:**

> This is a little short, but I think it's really sweet and cute and I like it lots and I hope y'all do too!  
> Happy Birthday to our most favoritest blue buck toothed babs~!


End file.
